


Last Train

by jedishampoo



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: 1979, Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, UKUS
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-20
Updated: 2012-01-20
Packaged: 2017-10-29 20:29:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/323874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jedishampoo/pseuds/jedishampoo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>UK/US (Arthur/Alfred) Human AU: Two guys meet at a party in Birmingham, UK, 1979. It's casual sex but what else is going on?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Last Train

**Title: Last Train**  
 **Author:** jedishampoo

 **Pairing:** UK/US (Actually, AU Arthur/Alfred)  
 **Rating:** R-l8  
 **Warnings:** Unprotected sex, infidelity, age difference, background OCs  
 **Summary:** Human AU: Meeting at a party in Birmingham, UK, 1979.

 **Author’s Notes:** This was originally written for the Hetalia kink meme, for the prompt of Human AU UK/US, casual sex at a party or club, with an Arthur who is in a relationship and an Alfred who maybe wants more. [Here’s the Kink Meme link to request and fic](http://hetalia-kink.livejournal.com/21125.html?thread=84901509#t84901509). Thanks to the OP for a great prompt, and many thanks to the awesome anons who commented. Thanks also to my gals conjure_lass and sharpeslass for their beta and Britpicking assistance; all remaining goofs are mine!

**Last Train**

  
It was nine twenty-eight, and Arthur was officially having a miserable time. He knew it was nine twenty-eight because he’d just looked again at the clock over the telly, and he knew he must be miserable because one was never supposed to watch the clock at this sort of party.

Adrian hadn’t wanted to come -- Adrian, who dug parties the way moles dug up Arthur’s garden -- but for the first time in years Arthur had grabbed hold of a mad passing whim and had taken the train to Birmingham and to Phil and Nigel’s annual pre-Bonfire Night bash. It was a cracking rout by any modern standard, crowded, smoky, and chatty, and the music hadn’t yet reached discotheque levels but it was a near thing.

Perhaps it had been a fit of pique, nothing else. Adrian’s bored eyes, eternally bored with Arthur, had barely widened when he’d said _well, I’m going then. Shall I say hello for you?_

 _Sure. Ta,_ Adrian had said, and had been gone before Arthur had even had a chance to make an exit in his party clothes.

Of course his party clothes, as Adrian would no doubt have pointed out, looked just like his regular clothes except he’d daringly gone sans tie. His shirt was starched white and properly buttoned where the other men lounged in unbuttoned, clinging silks. He, Arthur, was such a stick, wasn’t he? He sipped his Pimms. He was drinking Pimms because he had become some elderly, unhappy thing who should never have come to a party. He was thirty-four, and it was still nine twenty-eight.

A pretty, young woman carrying a metal tray shoved her way through the crowd. She stopped in front of Arthur and proffered the tray, which bore an array of pharmaceuticals, things to smoke or swallow or inhale through one’s nose. Over the speakers Roger Hodgson was singing about taking a jumbo to see the girls in California, _bah dah bah dum._ Arthur pretended to consider the drugs while actually trying to stare into the girl’s cleavage, at the sheen of glitter nestled within the deep vee of her dress. His ruse failed miserably.

“This round’s on Phil, luv,” the girl said, lowering the tray to allow Arthur a better view of her breasts. She was laughing. She wore feathered clips in her long hair. Her gleaming skin made Arthur think of nakedness and sweat, and he felt his thighs warm under his slacks. Just because he was shriveled didn’t mean he wasn’t still a pervert. Just because Adrian had lost interest in sex -- at least, in sex with him, if the overtime at work and late-night phone calls were any indication. They should have ended it long ago, really. It would have been easier.

The girl jiggled the tray and continued. “Phil said you needed to loosen up.”

“But I am loose,” Arthur said, finally meeting her eyes. He raised his cup and grinned to show just how loose he was.

The grin was a failure as well; the girl backed away a step, grimacing with her orange lips. “Christ! Put that away before you hurt somebody.”

By painful coincidence there was a lull in the music and the conversation at the same time, and Arthur slid the grin slowly back into his pocket as his eyes slid to the clock: nine twenty-nine.

Providence sent a riotous laugh from across the room to save Arthur and the captive girl. They both turned their heads to locate the source of the mirth. Someone replaced the party-mix cassette in the stereo, and conversation returned to its normal level.

But Arthur had zeroed in on the laugh and was staring at the culprit, captive for excruciating, heart-stopping moments, _nine twenty-nine and eleven, nine twenty-nine and twelve, nine twenty-nine and thirteen,_ of blue eyes behind oval spectacles. They belonged to a young man with an impossibly straight and white smile that was hugely bestowed on some poor sod next to him.

Arthur freed himself from the eyes and smile and looked back at the girl. She, however, was already shoving her way towards the man -- boy -- and the warmth in Arthur’s thighs crawled up into his belly, green-tinted and unpleasant.

He could say he was watching the girl’s bum as she left but he wasn’t; he was watching the white smile as it was thusly bestowed on her, and the ridiculous stray curl popping up from the man’s -- boy’s -- _irritating person’s_ \-- fair head. The curl wavered in the lamplight as the irritating person swayed and bounced to the smooth opening beat of the next song.

 _Oh Angel Eyyyyyyyes,_ Bryan Ferry oozed, and Arthur scowled at the person’s white cotton, button-down shirt, like Arthur’s except three buttons gone, and at his denims, rolled up at the ankles over high-topped sneakers like a 1950s teenager’s, like James Dean. The clothes and the silly spectacles and that curl of hair and all of it, everything, made Arthur’s stomach churn with unexpected hot emotion, made him want to say _how can you just stand here and look like that, making old sticks look like old fools, when the world is really such a dreary place?_

The young man saw Arthur looking at him and Arthur tried to glance away and sneer, but then decided that he needed to look at the person to sneer at him properly. So he glanced back. The toothy smile was bestowed on him like the Queen offering a wave, brief and sincerely insincere, before the person leaned in to hear what the feathered girl had to say.

Arthur drank to cool his belly and looked back at the clock. He probably saw the time. His glass was empty and he prowled off to hunt down another. He shoved his way into and then eventually back out of the kitchen carrying a Scotch, and encountered the … person blocking his way, grinning like a fucking white Christmas. _No matter now how high your moon shines down on me._

“Is that your girlfriend?” the person said.

Arthur glared. “You’re American.”

“Ha ha! I am. Don’t worry, I’m not interested.”

“What?”

“In the chick. Not that’s she’s not a fox or anything. But I wasn’t coming on to her.” The person looked at the girl anyway, wrapping his lips around the straw in his drink -- a straw, for chrissakes, like it was a Coke. He was taller than Arthur, blast it. And close up, Arthur could see that his baggy denims were loose and clung precariously to his hip-bones as he swayed a little in the cloud of smoke and music. A strip of tanned skin peeked out from below the hem of his untucked shirt.

“So do I pass inspection, man?”

Arthur snapped his gaze up and away from the … boy’s … stomach. And away from the smile and the cheerful blue eyes peering down at him. He’d been talking about the girl. _They_ had. He’d said he wasn’t interested but that was nothing to Arthur -- mere useless information.

“She’s not my bird,” Arthur said, trying to ignore his own heated cheeks as he ignored the question.

“Oh. Bird, huh? Funny. Are you somebody else’s bird, then?”

Arthur gaped. “What? No!”

The person’s eyes crinkled at the corners. “Oh. Right on.”

“No-- I … Not because I’m not-- that is-- Oh, never mind,” Arthur snapped, because explaining _bird_ would require too much work. Not because he didn’t feel like bringing up Adrian. Adrian, who could be with most anybody by now …

“Oh. Hah. Okay. I’m Al. Hi!”

“Al.” It sounded American. It sounded casual and upbeat and all the things that Arthur was not at the moment. “Why are you talking to me?”

If Al felt the sting of Arthur’s rudeness, he didn’t show it. “’Cause you were, like, glaring at me. And I wanted to see what was up. You have some pretty amazing eyebrows, you know?”

A wash of humiliation enveloped Arthur from his toes to his offendingly huge eyebrows. “Fuck off,” he said. He turned and tried to drown himself in his Scotch.

But Al grabbed him -- physically touched him -- on the shoulder. Arthur could have counted the fingers through his skin. “No! I’m sorry, man, I didn’t mean it like nothing bad. They’re cool. Expressive. Like--”

Arthur turned back towards Al but scowled down into his Scotch. “Anything. You mean _anything_ bad.”

“Huh? Oh. You’re right, hah. My grammar goes down the tubes when I’m desperate. You know?” Arthur glanced up at that because he wondered what Al could have possibly meant by _desperate,_ because surely he wasn’t desperate to talk to Arthur?

There was a flash of something unsure in Al’s eyes and he released Arthur with splayed fingers, like he’d touched a hot thing. Then he fired off a saucy gun-finger, winking and making a clicking noise in his cheek. “Phil tells me I get an ‘American pass.’ Do you have one of those handy?”

“I’ll wager Phil gives you all sorts of passes,” Arthur said in a low voice. Phil was an inveterate lecher.

“Phil’s a trip, ain’t he?” Al turned and flicked the gun-salute across the room at their hosts; they waved back, leering. Arthur realized he’d somehow forgotten for a few moments where they were and that there were other people there. He’d forgotten because he was too interested in Al: falling-quick-and-hard interested, like he hadn’t been in years, or in fact thought he was still capable of being. That was dangerous for many reasons, the first of which was that just because Al was forward didn’t mean that he was flirting. That he liked men at all.

“Quite,” Arthur said, taking a step backwards to try and extricate himself somewhat from the gravity-well of Al’s sex-appeal. Perversion continued to out itself in Arthur’s thoughts, however. Nigel had implied once that he and Phil shared; Arthur found himself wondering if they’d shared Al. He wondered what his bare stomach tasted like.

Al negated the step back by leaning in. Arthur smelled the rum on Al’s breath; he was drinking rum and Coke. “So you gonna tell me your name?”

Not just forward, but exceptionally forward. _American. Right._ He sighed. “Arthur Kirkland.”

“Like wow. Like King Arthur. Right on. What do you do, Arthur?”

“I am a solicitor,” Arthur said over the rim of his Scotch-glass.

“Um.” Al looked blank and Arthur’s ego cringed.

“An attorney.”

“Oh, right! That’s cool.” Al took another sip of his drink through his straw. “I’ve thought about going into law.”

“Don’t. It’s incredibly dull.”

“Maybe in England. I’d be like a groovy’ Atticus Finch.”

Arthur snorted and inhaled his Scotch when he did it; through his coughing fit and the choking tears in his eyes he saw Al move even closer, and felt Al’s hand on his back, a five-fingered caress. He smelled the soap scent of Al’s hair and that was when Arthur realized that all his life he’d been aware of the rotation of the Earth, because he was aware of when it stopped as well, as it halted in dead space for stretched moments. And then Al’s caress turned into a pat to stop his choking, and the world jerked into motion once more.

“Sorry, man,” Al grinned. “At least I got a laugh.”

“I wasn’t -- _coff_ laughing,” Arthur lied. He felt his face warm and wondered what color he was. Pink, or blue from lack of oxygen? Probably unattractive, whatever the case.

“Sputtering with offense?”

“You are ridiculous,” Arthur said, and would allow that he smiled that time.

“As long as you’re laughing with me,” Al said. He sucked at his drink again and his hips undulated to the beat of the song that was playing, and his lips formed the words, _If ya want my body, and ya think I’m sexy_ , and Arthur simply watched as he learned to breathe normally again. An inkling was starting to grow in his mind, a tiny spark in his heart that expanded and set his blood rushing to every extremity as Al wound his hips at him in slow circles. The inkling said that perhaps yes, he was being flirted with.

But of a sudden Al stopped his writhing and raised his eyebrows. Arthur looked down at his drink. Adrian told him often enough that he always looked sour, but that when he was deep in thought he looked bloody disapproving; Arthur supposed he’d done it again.

“What? You don’t like American music?”

Arthur looked up and choked out another laugh. “Irrelevant. Rod Stewart is English. Not that it’s a credit to the English.”

“Ha ha!” Al said. His eyes crinkled behind his spectacles and the corner of his mouth turned up; it was a knowing look. “God, I love your face. You know that?”

Arthur felt suddenly visible, like his skin was electric and glowing. He opened his mouth to say _how old are you?_ but before he could brave the words -- he probably didn’t want to know -- Al hooked a thumb over his shoulder.

“I gotta find the bathroom. Come talk with me while I wait in line, yeah?”

“You are unable to go alone?” Arthur said aloud, but his belly was sparking too, with lust; the blood rushing past his ears whispered to him that Adrian did not care for him at all, anymore. Al blinked at him, waiting, and Arthur sighed. _How old are you?_ “Yes, I will.”

The white teeth made a reappearance before Al turned and headed off. Athur followed and watched all of Al from behind, from his sneakers to the blond hair brushing the collar of his shirt, and then they talked about something as they stood waiting, about how Al was visiting friends in the UK, a present to himself for graduating from something or other; Arthur was distracted by his own haze of arousal and possibility, and _come on, sugar, let me know._

Then it was Al’s turn and he stepped into the toilet. Arthur hesitated on the threshold, prisoner of a hovering moment of sick doubt.

Al captured Arthur’s wrist and yanked him in, then kicked the door shut and locked it. He perched his rear on the edge of the sink counter and looked at Arthur. Earth lost her air for a moment again, because it was the turning of the world that produced the gravity, see?

“I don’t really have to go,” Al said. Arthur watched Al’s mouth for long seconds, trying to decide if he should offer a setdown or have a good scoff or shag him into the floor and -- why couldn’t he do anything? Al bit his lip, looking unbearably young, and Arthur finally stepped forward and kissed him, his lips hard and desperate. When he realized that Al was kissing him back he let his mouth soften, and licked the spot where Al had bitten his own lip. After a while he pulled back and stared at Al with a mixture of emotions he wasn’t used to feeling all at once, among them shame, fear, and perhaps even elation.

“I don’t do that,” Arthur said for lack of anything better to say.

“Well, you did,” Al said, pushing himself up to sit on the counter.

“So I did.”

“So did I. It was great,” Al said. He crawled his fingers up Arthur’s sleeves.

“Was it?” Arthur grinned, showing teeth, feeling rather predatory and liking the feeling. He lifted the spectacles from Al’s nose and dropped them onto the sink.

“Yeah. And if it wasn’t for your eyebrows I’da never known you were into me, you know?”

“What an odd thing to say,” Arthur said. He pressed forward between Al’s legs, pulling him close and licking his teeth. Al caught Arthur’s hips in a thigh-lock and stole his breath with his wide, eager mouth. In return Arthur tried to breathe Al’s optimism, his ownership of the world.

“Yeah,” Al whispered after a bit and rocked his hips against Arthur’s in a slow, steady beat. When Arthur pulled back again his shame had been banished by the taste of rum and promise of the impossible. Al was flushed and pleased-looking and his mouth so kiss-shiny that Arthur could barely stand to look at him. So he sucked at the pulse under Al’s jawbone and clutched at the warm skin of his belly under his shirt.

“You gonna do me, Arthur?” Al panted into Arthur’s hair. “Will you fuck me?”

“God, yes,” Arthur sighed harshly into Al’s spit-sticky skin. Then it was like his brain shook itself inside his head. _Adrian_ … and they were in Phil and Nigel’s loo, for chrissakes. Not that it wasn’t a large, pleasant room with all the modcons, but still … He took a step back. “Wait. I don’t even ... shouldn’t we at least have a drink -- or tea or -- you drink coffee, I’m sure? And talk first or--”

“We talked.” Al started yanking the ends of Arthur’s shirt out of his trousers.

“Fuck off!” Arthur yelled, but not at Al; someone rather demanding was thumping at the door. Then, in a lower voice, “Tell me your last name? What Al is short for, at least?”

“Alfred.” Alfred started unfastening Arthur’s trousers with his long, quick fingers. “Jones.”

“Very British-sounding,” Arthur said. His brain had finally caught back up with the rest of his sex-starved body and he began to pry apart the buttons on Al’s -- Alfred’s _oh, he liked that name better_ \-- shirt. American men weren’t as hairy as Arthur had been led to believe; he traced a tantalizing little line of blond hair down Alfred’s flat belly with his fingers, and swirled his thumb in Alfred’s navel until his stomach muscles seized.

“Mmmm. Hah -- not me. I’m all American, dude,” Alfred said.

“Dude. Dude ranch,” Arthur said, and leaned forward to kiss Alfred again, roving his hands across as much skin as he could, smooth flesh in his fingers. Alfred shuddered when Arthur slid a finger into the crack of his arse and pressed in; there wasn’t anywhere on Alfred’s body that Arthur didn’t want to touch.

Alfred moaned into his mouth. “You’re so weird, Arthur. Oh, God.”

Arthur pulled back to give Alfred the long look he’d been afraid to give earlier, and felt his own heart slip through his fingers. It wasn’t like the sixties when instantaneous sex had involved mere drugs and gonads; Arthur had grown up and learned to think too much and the fascination in Al’s eyes reminded him what it was like to be daring. Impossibly so.

“Touch me, you,” he whispered, a test, and watched Alfred’s hand push into the open fly of his slacks and pull out his cock, _God, he’d been hard for hours, it seemed,_ and stroke it, thumb smoothing fluid up and down it until Arthur was gasping and swaying with the motion of Alfred’s hand. Alfred leaned in and swiped his tongue over Arthur’s lips, slow and teasing.

“Maybe I should get some spit on it before you fuck me,” Alfred said into Arthur’s mouth. Arthur choked out another pained laugh.

“Idiot,” he murmured, not unkindly. He nudged Alfred’s head aside and opened the cabinet behind him. “They’re sure to have something in here.”

“Uh-huh.” While Arthur searched Alfred turned and dropped trou and gripped the sink, wiggling his bare arse against Arthur’s cock until Arthur nearly dropped the tube of lubricant he’d turned up. _Mmm, hurry, mmmm,_ he said, stroking his own cock at Arthur’s reflection in the mirror, and there was no clock but Arthur could see the outlines of the half-seconds as they passed, imprinting onto his memory the brief spasms of excitement that life had offered him. Somehow Arthur opened the tube and squeezed a glop onto his fingers and admired Alfred’s nicely rounded arse cheeks as he parted them. Alfred moaned _yeah yeah yeah._ when Arthur pushed a finger inside and Alfred was tense and tight and hot and Arthur guided his cock to replace his finger and _fuck_ , he wanted him -- except …

Someone thumped at the door again. Arthur sighed. “This will not be possible,” he said.

“What? Why not?” Alfred said, a little high note that sounded like panic coloring his words.

“There’s not enough time. I don’t want to hurt you, for fuck’s sake.”

Alfred twisted his neck to give Arthur a stiff-looking grin over his shoulder. “Oh, I’ll be okay, dude. I’m stronger than I look.”

“But--”

“No, really. Go for it.” Alfred was pushing back with his rear, as insistent with actions as words.

“I don’t think I should,” Arthur said, rocking his cock back and forth through the slickened crack of Alfred’s arse even as he spoke. It felt lovely, lovely--

“Jesus, Arthur. Just do it!”

“Fuck off!” Arthur yelled again, either to the anonymous door-thumper or Alfred, he wasn’t sure which -- maybe it was both -- either way, he thrust his hips forward and Alfred rocked back and his cock edged inside, past the tight muscle of Al’s shuddering body. Once there the promise of clenching friction induced him to move, and his thighs trembled with the effort to keep his thrusts slow and shallow. Al shuddered and gasped as he hovered over the sink. Arthur rocked his hips and watched Alfred in the mirror, saw his gritted teeth, and the fringe of his blond hair swinging over his eyes. His erection flagged a bit but he joined Arthur’s rhythm almost violently, so that soon enough Arthur was riding him deep and hard.

“Ungh. Arthur, so glad you know -- what you’re doing,” Alfred groaned, and every time Alfred said his name Arthur’s arousal thrilled higher -- it made him feel … un-anonymous. There was no reason not to reciprocate as he fucked poor Alfred’s bent, straining body, but he’d thought the name so many times already, he almost preferred to savor it privately.

 _Alfred._ For a few minutes he just fucked him, hearing their sharp breaths and the slap of skin and the muffled thump of the music in his eardrums, or maybe it was his own heartbeat -- _Heart’s beating like a drum; now we’re all alone_ \-- and as the thigh-clenching sexual ache grew he moved faster and felt Alfred’s body loosen, begin to glide with him, no longer fighting for control. It felt good, amazingly so. Arthur could see his own slack jaw in the mirror but it was too erotic to watch, so he bent forward to hug Alfred closer, to lick the sweat burgeoning on the skin of his back.

“Thass good. Good,” he whispered, and fondled Alfred’s cock to its former stiffness while Alfred breathed _Ah, ah_ at him in time with his thrusts. Over and over Arthur stroked Alfred’s firm cock with firm strokes, scraping his own knuckles against the sink over and over as he did so -- Alfred had to come first, and they had to hurry--

“Ow.”

Alfred had bent so low he’d rammed his head into the metal spout over the sink. Despite his pity for poor Alfred’s head Arthur barked out a laugh; rhythm escaped him at that and he trembled to a halt. He slid his cock out and took a step back.

Alfred bent down to the floor, grunting. Fearing Alfred had a concussion, Arthur reached town to run his fingers through his slightly damp hair.

“Are you quite all right--” he began, but then Alfred stood. He was smiling and holding one of his high-top sneakers by the laces.

“Lemme get my jeans off--”

“We don’t have time,” Arthur complained. His cock complained. It had been chafed to such sensitivity that the mere brush of air was painful.

“Cool your jets! Here.” Alfred was hopping and swaying on one leg, trying to pull the other out of his jeans. His bits were bobbing and he looked ridiculous, but it was a ridiculous that Arthur thought he could probably have watched all night. Longer, perhaps, if they’d had the time.

There were voices outside the door. Arthur’s heart raced and he wasn’t sure if he was panicking or growing more excited at the thought of an audience. “What are you trying to do--?"

"There." Alfred shook out a bare leg and then boosted himself back up to sit on the sink. "This oughta be better."

Alfred sighed a sigh of sheer joy; the resumption of sex and the threat of discovery and the promise of watching Alfred’s face as he fucked him -- it was almost too much. First he had to bend down and kiss Alfred’s belly in thanks. Alfred’s breathing hitched when Arthur jabbed his tongue into his navel, an already-discovered sensitive spot.

“Hurry, Arthur hurry I want you to drill me so bad--” Alfred moaned.

“Good lord,” Arthur said, half to himself, but not complaining. When he stood Alfred lifted his bare leg and hoicked it over Arthur's shoulder, then leaned back on his hands to improve his impossible angle in what was an incredibly awkward space to begin with. He was wide open and this time Arthur was even less gentle as he drove his cock inside him, watching with some satisfaction as Alfred’s nostrils flared at the pleasure -- or the pain, perhaps. Arthur pressed his face to the inside of Alfred’s knee and let his body find the right rhythm; his body wanted it fast and hard and so did Alfred, apparently.

“Do it. Do it,” Alfred chanted at him, in time with Arthur’s thrusts, the clench of his fingers on Alfred’s thighs. His head was bent back against the mirror at an uncomfortable-looking angle and his smile was lunatic. He bit his lip again.

“I think I must be -- ah -- nearly twice your age,” Arthur said, unable to stop himself.

“You don’t look like it, Arthur. Ah! There there there--”

Arthur angled his hips to keep hitting Alfred inside _there_. “I feel like it.”

“God, you don’t feel like it to me, either.” Alfred stopped talking in favor of breathing in rhythmic, sharp cries. He reached out to press his palm against Arthur’s face; Arthur wasn’t sure if he was being quieted, or explored, or what, but he licked between Alfred’s fingers and thrust and thrust with his hips and listened to Alfred’s erotic noises and his cock was so stimulated it was wired, it was live, anything could set it off.

Slowing down helped and he made up for it in the force of his fucking, in stroking Alfred’s cock while Alfred stroked his cheeks and then pushed his thumb into Arthur’s mouth and when Arthur sucked on it Alfred’s body tightened all over, all at once, and with _unh, unhs_ he came -- brief spasms of life, of excitement, around Arthur’s cock. Someone might have been pounding at the door or they might not have; either way, Arthur rushed his hips to match the thump in his eardrums until his wire was tripped, electric for a few sparking, heart-pounding moments as he climaxed as well, _aaah_ ing around Alfred’s thumb.

Arthur breathed. In the next few moments of quiet, the thumping noise resolved itself into the rush of blood through his ears. And Alfred was laughing rather breathlessly.

“Hah-- hah. What a rush,” he said as they detached from one another. He’d been bent against the mirror until his chin was jammed onto his chest. Arthur helped him ease his thigh off his shoulder. “My neck’s gonna hurt worse than my ass, you know?”

“You--” Arthur began, and rolled his eyes. Perhaps a little cynicism would take the edge off of what he was sure was his own stupidly pleased expression. He stepped back. His ribs felt tight. “You-- you … Alfred.”

“Ha hah!” Alfred slid off the counter with a wince, and stood mouth-to-nose with Arthur. Blast him. “Nobody calls me Alfred,” he breathed through a grin.

“I do,” Arthur said. He massaged Alfred’s poor neck while he kissed him again, for perhaps the last time. To his surprise the kisses were no less exciting or sweet than they’d been before the sex. It was a pity he’d never have the chance to retrieve his heart.

Reality intruded in the form of a new song, the opening strains creeping through the bottom of the door. Arthur sighed. He wanted reality to go fuck itself, though he knew it wouldn’t. He released Alfred and pulled away. For good. For the last time.

“Fine, fine,” Alfred sighed back. “S’pose we’d better get dressed.”

“Quite.”

They hurried into their clothes, taking a moment here and there to splash off the most visible signs of semen. They didn’t talk and Arthur spent a few moments trying to decide if the silence was uncomfortable or not, and then a few more deciding to just let it be whatever it was going to be. Exposure and recrimination most likely lay outside the door, and that was what he needed to fear. That and one more rather large thing.

“We ready?” Alfred said after a bit, fingers twitching on the doorknob, his grin at Arthur showing that exposure and recrimination held no power over him. When Arthur nodded, he opened the door. To --

There was nobody outside it; the upstairs hallway was empty, except for a girl sleeping on the floor in front of the door. Arthur shared Alfred’s grin. Alfred then bent down and patted the girl on the shoulder.

“Hey, sweetheart. How are you doin’?” he asked her.

The girl opened her eyes with visible effort and looked back and forth between them blearily. “Izzit my turn?”

“Your turn, love,” Arthur told her.

“Oh, good,” she said, and crawled past them into the loo. Alfred took Arthur’s hand and Arthur … just stood there. Downstairs Cliff Richard sang _it’s so funny how we don’t talk anymore._

“Can I go somewhere with you?” Alfred asked.

Arthur tried to remember how a boring person breathed. “Go somewhere?”

“Yeah. Maybe get coffee like you wanted, you know? And maybe I could, like, stay with you tonight?”

Arthur stared. “I -- I have to go home first, and do something difficult,” he blurted. He couldn’t even contemplate -- could never even imagine being happy until --

“Go? Difficult?” Al’s smile flattened the slightest bit.

“I need to go home and split from my girlfriend.”

Alfred gaped. “Girlfriend?”

Arthur swallowed. He closed his eyes, and then realized that was a cowardly act and he could not afford to be cowardly anymore. So he opened them again. “Yes. She’s at home. In London. Possibly. If she’s not out with someone else.”

“Oh. No wonder I was a little conf--” Alfred cut himself off and tightened his lips and glanced down the hall. He dropped Arthur’s hand and shoved his own into his jeans pocket, then did the same with his other hand. “Well, don’t do it on my account, dude. I mean--”

Arthur’s courage had returned to the point where he knew that Alfred was disappointed. Because of him, Arthur. The old stick. He put his hand on Alfred’s shoulder and waited for Alfred to look at him. “It’s not. It’s long overdue. And probably will come as a relief to her. But I couldn’t in all conscience be falling for someone else when …” He halted, realizing exactly how bold he’d been.

But Alfred’s full smile returned. “Oh. That sounds really tough, man. Um. So. Do you have time for coffee first? Wanna talk about it?”

Arthur looked around for a clock and then realized he was wearing a watch. In the dark he could just make out the time -- half past ten. “If I catch the last train, then yes.”

“Cool.”

They looked rather stupidly at each other for a few extended seconds. Reality began to intrude again in the form of partygoers -- people coming down the hall, the girl stumbling out of the bathroom. Arthur led the way down the stairs, to the coat-closetroom, and then out, giving their hosts a quick salute before making his escape.

The air outside was chilly and Arthur was thankful for his wool coat. Alfred had his hands shoved in his pockets again; he was wearing some type of aviator jacket.

“I’m really glad I decided to come to the UK for my graduation,” Alfred said, his breath clouding the air.

Arthur felt that world-winding vertigo he was coming to recognize. It caught him in the act of pulling on one of his gloves. “Graduation?”

“Yeah? High school graduation?”

Arthur suddenly grew warm enough that he didn’t need his gloves. “I wish you hadn’t told me that,” he said, peeling them off again.

“I already did, once,” Alfred said, rolling his eyes. “You’re so weird, Arthur.”

“Fuck off,” Arthur said to reality. He grabbed Al’s hand and began walking towards the station.

  
**END**

_Thank you for reading! Concrit, comments, all are desired and loved and appreciated._

**End Note:** This fic has a groovy, five-song, 1979 UK disco soundtrack. The songs to seek out are:

"Breakfast in America" by Supertramp  
"We Don't Talk Anymore" by Cliff Richard  
"Do Ya Think I'm Sexy" by Rod Stewart  
"Angel Eyes" by Bryan Ferry & Roxy Music  
“Last Train to London” by Electric Light Orchestra


End file.
